


Of Yore and Affliction

by artvinsky



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-08-25
Updated: 2013-01-19
Packaged: 2017-11-12 20:55:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/495551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artvinsky/pseuds/artvinsky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Episode 4 AU: He learns that she’s still an Avatar-in-training while they fight, that she’s yet to master airbending, to even produce a puff of air. Something she holds contempt for as they splash each other’s face with seawater. He knows now that she’s part of that pro-bending team on the newspaper, the Fire Ferrets; that she’s going to introduce him to them tomorrow if he wants, if he’s not going home yet. He agrees, more eager to acquaint himself with the city and to forget what he’s left behind, who he’s left behind. Tarrlok’s grief still echoes in his mind when he closes him eyes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. i

His lips are chapped as his feet trudges through the thick blanket of snow. The voice of his brother, of Tarrlok screaming for his return has already disappeared from his ears, and instead the sound of the wind howling takes its place. He sees nothing, and his vision whites out from the snowflakes that cling to his eyelashes. Noatak is too weak, to even keep the snow from buffeting him from all directions and he collapses, his mind already reeling from the cold.

He regrets running, he regrets leaving Tarrlok, and while he attempts to rise from the growing cover of snow on his back, he doesn’t stand. His elbows and shoulders too weak to do so. The dark freezes over him before he’s the chance to shed even a tear of remorse, Tarrlok’s fearful face refusing to disappear from his mind.

He is not aware to the abrupt silence of the storm, and he does not see the glow that hovers above him, as though it watches him get swallowed by the ice melting into a sea of water. He sinks.

—-

Even with Naga trailing behind her as she walks on the shores of Air Temple Island, Korra can’t help but feel unease niggling on the nape of her neck. Her forehead is warm where Amon’s fingers brushed her in the nightmare she just woke up from but the air bites at her bare arms like the beginning of the cold seasons. While taking walks on the beach do help her, it seems that the disquiet still has its hold on her.

She rouses from her reverie when Naga growls at something, something washed up not far from where they stand. Korra squints at the figure, trying to discern whether or not it was a dead penguin or something else. She jumps when the figure turns over and she sees a face. The face of a water tribe boy, not much younger than her, hidden behind clumps of his wet, brown hair that are plastered to his face.

She runs to him and checks his pulse, his breathing, Sifu Katara’s words about healing echoing in her mind. He breathes, but barely. She sets him carefully on Naga before looking around the beach, wondering where on earth he would have come from.

They turn back to the temple and Korra feels the boy’s breathing hitch ever so slightly.

—-

He blinks when the light grows behind his closed eyelids. When Noatak looks to the ceiling, letting his eyes dart about the furniture and the way the room is set out he realizes – this is not his home. When he sits up, he remembers what he’s left behind and scowls. He remembers Tarrlok, he remembers his father, no, Yakone’s cries of pain by his hold and he remembers running into the storm, not looking back.

He sits up when he hears footsteps making the wooden floor creak outside his door, and he feels her, each step she makes, each breath. He struggles to keep his composure at the sheer power that flows through the woman outside but when she opens the door, he isn’t sure what to think.

“Oh, hey you’re awake,” says the girl at her door. Even though she has features that Noatak grew up with, coffee-coloured skin and blue eyes, she’s totally unlike anyone he’s ever seen. Her body was built yet soft in places and her veneer just – unyielding if anything. Noatak swallows a lump that forms in his throat and looks away, trying to control the blood that rushed to his face. No girl from his village ever looked like her, yet her hair; he remembers putting it up as she does when he was a child. “How are you feeling?”

He remains silent but still she fills the silence. “I mean, it was cold yesterday when I found you.”

“Where’d you find me?” he forces out, his fists clenching out of habit.

“The beach. I was going for a walk to clear my head and there you were.” He senses something else in her tone, distress and he sees her hands shaking at her sides subtly.

“I see,” he breathes. He lets a pause drift between them before asking, “Who are you?”

The poorly-hidden distress immediately disappears from her façade and back is her tenacity. “I’m Korra. The Avatar.”

His lips thin to a line and his fists clench even harder underneath the fleece sheets that cover him. The Avatar, a waterbender? Not the airbending monk from his father’s- from Yakone’s tales, it seems. He doesn’t know what passes from his lips next; a question, “the Avatar?”

“Yeah, deal with it.” and she even has the boldness to laugh. Noatak finds himself scowling but he remembers that his is not what his father honed him to be, no, he’s more than that. “Who are you?”

He thinks for an answer. He is gone from his brother in the North, his name means nothing but still he would use it, out of sentiment, he thinks. “Noatak.”

“Well, Noatak-” she strides over to him and next thing he knows, they’re shaking hands, and hers is small in his, but it is firm, strong, calloused. She positively beams at him. “Nice to meet you, there’s breakfast if you’re up for it.”

He begins to decline her offer, because he wants to sink back into the bed, to think, to contemplate. Unfortunately his stomach grumbles loud enough to serve as his answer and he scowls.

“All right,” is all he says as he gets out of bed and follows her.

—-

Republic City is far from what Yakone’s stories made it out to be. If anything, it was grand, it was imposing, as far from his little village as it could ever dream of becoming. He finds himself looking out into Yue Bay, as Korra referred to it, while he eats the bowl of muesli she provided him moments ago.

She reads over the newspaper while he eats and he catches the date, 氵170 ASC, and bites his tongue to hold his surprise. He’s meant to be about forty years old now, but how did he even get to this time period? How?

‘ _Amon still at large, now a danger to the city more than ever’_ , he reads on the front cover of the newspaper along with ‘ _The Fire Ferrets join 7 other teams in the qualifier for this year’s Pro-bending championships’_ but the former interests him more. After finishing a bite of his cereal he asks, “Amon? Who is he?”

And somehow the subject strikes her, the anxiety returns and even while she tries to mask it, Noatak can still feel it as it fills her; the Avatar, afraid of the masked man on the headline of the newspaper, perhaps? He listens intently at her answer. “He’s the leader of this anti-bender group called the Equalists.”

“Can he really take away peoples’ bending?” Noatak asks as he reads more of the article. Korra’s anxiety rises as in the thickening silence between them, and he almost regrets bringing up the subject. She cuts him off before he can tell her to drop it.

“Yeah, I’ve seen it.” And then he realizes, this man, Amon has reduced the Avatar into a fear-ridden wreck. Aang would have put a stop to this man immediately, but what has Korra done, if she was indeed, the Avatar?

He remembers how Yakone placed him on a pedestal and expected Tarrlok to do the same as he has, forgetting the fact that Tarrlok was younger than him by years. He should not compare her to Aang, or at least, what Yakone’s depiction of the past Avatar was. Her heart still beats in that uncertain rhythm, fear-ridden and he feels pity for it, for her.

“I need some air.” And he rises from his seat, rubbing his hands together, beckoning her to follow him out the door.

“You know, I never thought I’d meet another water tribe person up here,” he hears her say, as they walk to the docks of the island where a ferry was anchored.

“Didn’t you? This is Republic City, Avatar Korra,” he answers as he swings his feet to the water’s edge. “People from all walks of life are up and about here.”

“Yeah,” settles beside him, water splashing against his boots when she brings her feet to the water. “But I don’t think water tribe people usually get beached on Air Temple Island anyway..”

How, he thinks. But he abandons his calm when he realizes that the water keeps splashing onto his boots by Korra’s doing. He forces a burst of water at her in retaliation and laughs when she’s sopping wet. He jumps away, his muscles aching while he evades a wave that she brings up to the docks, but he finds himself laughing, in sheer joy at the act of bending, simply. She’s indignant when she pushes the hair out of her face but then he sees the mischief pulling the corners of her mouth.

“You want a bending battle, then? Huh, Noatak?” she challenges.

He thinks, what of the bloodbending that he’s mastered, would that count for anything here? Would she fear him? Would she fall easily under his control just like Tarrlok did? He pushes the thought from his mind and holds his hands steadily in front of him. Bloodbending was his father’s wishes, not his.

“My pleasure, Avatar Korra.”

—-

He learns that she’s still an Avatar-in-training while they fight, that she’s yet to master airbending, to even produce a puff of air. Something she holds contempt for as they splash each other’s face with seawater. He knows now that she’s part of that pro-bending team on the newspaper, the Fire Ferrets; that she’s going to introduce him to them tomorrow if he wants, if he’s not going home yet. He agrees, more eager to acquaint himself with the city and to forget what he’s left behind, who he’s left behind. Tarrlok’s grief still echoes in his mind when he closes him eyes.

At dinner he meets Avatar Aang’s son and Korra’s airbending mentor, Councilman Tenzin and while he sits amongst them and the airbender children, he can’t help but feel the warmth that this family has compared to his. He hates them for it but he shouldn’t, he knows better than to.

They ask him about going home, and he lies, compulsively. To their questions of his family, he builds a lie based on his own truth, that yes, he has a father, a mother and a brother but he’s separated from them. A boat ride to the city from the North, a storm, he fell over the ship’s railing. Councilman Tenzin has promised that they would help him find his family and again he lies, and gratefully accepts the man’s help.

He is not surprised by the stories that come from his mouth; he even entertains the questions that the airbender kids shoot at him. But he himself is not convinced as to how he got there, to the city, to the year. But they take him in easily enough, and it’s good enough for him.

Korra takes him back to his room, and he’s sincerely grateful for her, for her finding him on the beach. She promises him that tomorrow he meets her friends, that he sees the city. And he goes to bed, sincerely thanking her once she goes, but the images of his brother creeping up in his mind once again. He sleeps in his regret.


	2. ii

“Noatak.” He looks up from his breakfast to meet the eyes of Councilman Tenzin. Korra sits beside him, her attention shifting from their conversation to the sun appearing behind the clouds outside the window. Noatak notices Tenzin glance worriedly at Korra before turning back to him. “Make yourself at home but I will relay your situation to the Northern Water Tribe councilman so that we can assist you in getting back to your family.”

Ah, his family. His family forged from the one he’s left in the storm two days ago, rather forty years ago. He still fails to grasp the fact that he’s here, that he’s in the dead Avatar Aang’s air temple, that he’s sitting next to the now-Avatar Korra having breakfast. But he gives a smile, a false smile, and sees the councilman leave on his flying bison. Yet he feels a glow blooming in his chest because he thinks of how selfless it is for them to even house him, a mere stranger, no – Yakone’s son.

He has not told them the truth yet. He does not want to. It’s pointless. He’s going to make a new start here, to make do with whatever he ended up with. With the Avatar, with Korra.

 She’s older than him, he learns, by three years or so and he is somewhat grateful that he’s her height, if not a little bit taller. While they walk towards where she usually practices her airbending, they talk, easily, casually, as though they’ve been friends for longer than two days. They talk like people, like equals. Not like the saviour of the world speaking to a tyrannical criminal’s son.

“This is funny, I left the South Pole but I didn’t have friends down there,” she begins casually, pacing around in circles as she evens out her breathing. Noatak sits on a step across her, taking a sphere of water from a muddy patch of grass and wringing out the dirt that floated in it until it was clean. He frowns at how easy her laugh is when she talks. “You’re the first water tribe person I’ve made friends with, not counting Sifu Katara, I mean.”

He doesn’t realize what he says next. “That’s sad.”

He wishes to take it back as soon as it passes from his lips but he keeps his composure while hers flares. But before she can even snap at him and eat him alive he keeps speaking, in that deathly nonchalant tone of his. “I don’t blame you. I wouldn’t even bother being friends with the people who kept me caged up either, if I was I mean.”

“Noatak, shut up.” Her voice is short, clipped, and she on the verge of jumping at him as her fists were visibly shaking at her sides. She scowls at him, but she eases herself through her breathing. “But you’re right, they did do that to me. But they only meant to carry out what Aang asked them to do. He told them to protect me-”

“And did they by keeping you caged up in that compound down South?” he scoffs. He can hardly believe it. A girl like her without friends, hidden away like an animal, like an invalid? If she’d come from his village, Tarrlok would’ve been friends with her in a heartbeat. He would too, but then they would argue, like they have now. “They should’ve let you go around and learn how Avatar Aang and Roku did. They should’ve let you travel and see the world, learn about it-”

“What, so I’d be a better Avatar? Is that it?” Her voice is curt but he can feel the insecurity resurfacing in her, and she’s taking measures to keep it from doing so, to no avail. He can feel it, like he has earlier at breakfast. She was unsettled, still fresh from a nightmare about that masked revolutionary running around, he’s guessed. He sighs when she turns away from him, her strong veneer collapsed into her hunched figure. “Yeah, I guess they should’ve. Otherwise I’d be able to airbend by now, maybe talk to Aang…”

He doesn’t like her weakness, it feels awkward on her to say the least. Because she feels so much like the brother he’s left behind. But who is he to decide who she is? He supresses the urge to bend the nerves right out of her, and instead splashes her with the water in his hands. Funnily enough, he does sort of bend the nerves right out of her in a way, because they are gone when she sprints after him down to the beach.

She forgets her anger, her insecurities and he forgets his past. It is like being free. It is like being a child again.

\---

He mimics the spirals that she draws on the pavement and he learns how easily it was to learn the art of airbending. But to actually bend air, now that was a different story. When she halts her stances, she turns to him, he sees curiosity peeking through her blue eyes.

 “You said that you have a brother right?”

“Yeah.” He quirks his eyebrow as if to ask her where she plans on going with this conversation.

“What’s he like? Is he as much of a stick in the mud as you?” she asks jokingly.

“He’s younger than me but I think you’d like him better,” he admits because he believes it to be true. He doesn’t realize that he has a smile on his lips until much later, when they’ve returned to practicing their stances.

At the end of the day as the sun has set, when they’re all tired out, they just spin around to the music playing on the radio. It’s almost like dancing, Noatak notes, but then again, airbending did look like dancing to him anyway. When the soft jazzy music fills the silence between them, this is when Noatak first hears Amon’s voice.

“Good evening, my fellow Equalists. This is your leader, Amon,” a smooth voice drips out from the speaker and Noatak somehow sees the revolutionary lounging easily with a microphone in his hand while his followers surround him, serving him when he makes his message to the city. He shifts his focus to Korra when he feels her stiffen from the voice on the radio, her heartbeat increasing in pace. “As you've heard the Republic Council has voted to make me public enemy number one proving once again that the bending oppressors of this city will stop at nothing to quash our revolution.”

“But we cannot be stopped.” Noatak sees Korra’s bright eyes take that fearful spark to them that reminds him so much of Tarrlok’s fear for Yakone, because it reminds him of weakness. He walks towards the device, his hands moving steadily to turn it off. “Our numbers grow stronger by the day. You no longer have to live in fear. The time has come for benders to experience fear.”

As Korra starts to hyperventilate in a strange quiet manner, he unplugs the device instead, not knowing what switch to press to cut off the quiet trumpet that begins to fill the air again. When he turns back to see her, he is not sure to feel about the cold sweat that coated her brow in a fevered sheen.

Her nerves are erratic and as much as he tells himself that it not his right to do what he will do to her now, he goes through with easing her. With his bloodbending he takes away the pain, the anxiety and he forces her chi against its aberrant flow. She doesn’t notice because she thinks that the breathing she does is what helps her.

“So that was Amon,” he says after a beat, his voice low. “He speaks well.”

Korra watches him uncertainly before lowering her head and giving a fatigued sigh. “He does, doesn’t he?”

It doesn’t take much for him to sense that she is weak seeing as she doesn’t even do as much to even try and conceal it. When he walks back over her, he puts on his a smile that he’s used on Tarrlok, a comforting smile and settles an assuring hand on her shoulder.

“I think we’ve done enough training for today,” he tries his older brother approach, hoping to ease her further without the use of his bending. “You’ve been really focused today, Korra. Take a break, have some food.”

On cue her stomach emits a less than dignified rumble and his follows. They laugh as they walk back inside the air temple, the fear from Amon’s announcement subsiding from her. “Yeah, food does sound good. I think I’m in the mood for some seaweed noodles.”

\---

Pema and the children, Jinora, Ikki and Meelo greet him easily when they settle down for dinner, they greet him as though he was a distant cousin of some sort, and he’s made to feel like part of the family. Ikki’s mentioned something about looking like Korra because of their similar hairstyles and he understands, somewhat. They quiet down when Tenzin begins to say grace for them all.

“We are grateful for this delicious food, for happiness, for compassion, and—”

“I'm not interrupting, am I?” A voice chimes in from outside and it sets him on edge because of the alien familiarity. Noatak almost chokes on his drink when he sees his father, albeit younger than he’s even seen him walk into the room in a sharp water tribe oriented clothes than they would never have been able to afford. His surprise simmers down to indifference when everyone at the table forces their eyes to the man bowing out of courtesy.

Noatak finds himself leering at this man with Yakone’s face when he takes Korra in with a calculating glance. Noatak grinds his teeth, because he wants to throw himself on this man, to get him out of this home, because he feels nothing but tribulation emanate from him. Because this man with Yakone’s face will, and he knows, ruin whatever he’s already built for himself here. Then the man’s eyes find Noatak’s.

For a moment, the time stops. The man’s breathing hitches ever so slightly, and while the others may not have noticed, Noatak does. He sees the boy, the fearful boy he’s left in the storm once more when he stares deep into the pair of grey eyes that he thought he’s never going to see again. He clenches his fists on his lap and looks away, turning instead to his food with a waning appetite.

“What-” Tenzin chokes out, indignant. “This is my home, Tarrlok. We're about to eat dinner.”

Of course. He should have guessed that growing up would mean that they will have their father’s face, something that neither he nor Tarrlok would ever come to avoid, unless an accident happens of course. But it’s become quite clear that his younger brother, now thirty-seven years of age, has not been in an accident just yet.

His surprise at seeing Noatak disappears back into that charming guise and Tarrlok gives an easy laugh. “Good, because I am absolutely famished. Airbenders never turn away a hungry guest, am I right?”

He keeps quiet, but he laughs from behind his glass of water when Ikki comments on Tarrlok’s ponytails (it seems he’s gained another) and his smelling like a lady with the vanilla and citrus (like mom did). He refrains from scoffing when he unwillingly listens to Tarrlok talk himself up at Korra’s expense, at him being the Northern Water Tribe councilman, listening to his younger brother relay her bravery in attending an Equalist rally that’s happened a while back, about her initiative-

“Enough with the flattery, Tarrlok. What do you want from Korra?” Tenzin cuts from across the dinner table.

“Patience, Tenzin. I'm getting to that.” When he glances across Korra, Noatak notices that Tarrlok speaks not only to her, the Avatar, but to him as well and no one else.  “As you may have heard, I am assembling a task force that will strike at the heart of the revolution and I want you to join me.”

Noatak is not surprised when Korra turns his brother down, because he’s understood her, he’s taken measures careful, discreet to read her. Now he sees her as an open book. He keeps himself from smiling at Tarrlok’s initial distraught but then this is short-lived because the fear in Korra resurfaces again. Tenzin interrupts any of the other councilman’s further attempts in persuading Korra.

“Korra gave you her answer. It's time for you to go.”

“Ah, not yet, Tenzin.” Tarrlok’s gaze shifts from Korra to him, and for once, he doesn’t see anything, he doesn’t read anything from his brother’s eyes. “I’ve also dropped by to see this young man here. Noatak, your family and I have been worried sick about you.”

“Wait, hold on.” Korra snaps out of her deflated reverie to glance between him and Tarrlok. “You guys are related?”

“Yes, he’s my nephew. My brother’s contacted me from the North saying how Noatak was lost at sea after Tenzin approached me about finding a mysterious water tribe boy on his island yesterday.” It’s a lie if he’s ever heard one, Noatak thinks, but it connects to his story way too much to be just a coincidence. The airbenders and Korra don’t seem to notice because Tarrlok lies so easily with that silver tongue of his, something Noatak’s seen at its early stages.

“It saves me from wasting time not knowing where to look for you, _Uncle_ Tarrlok,” he hisses out the word severly, annoyed at how the balance has so clearly shifted. “It’s nice to see you again, thanks for coming.”

“I assume you’re going to take guardianship of him now, Tarrlok?” Tenzin asks, the hostility gone from the earlier exchange. Noatak wonders if all politicians have the ability to change like coins at a moment’s notice, if it’s Tenzin’s nature as an airbender or Tarrlok’s natural talent for being such a liar that got them their positions on the council. He doesn’t linger on it when he notices Korra looking at him worriedly.

“You can’t just leave,” she whispers to him when they eat, while Tarrlok, Tenzin and Pema discuss him.

“I’ll still be around, Korra,” he tells her but he doesn’t want to leave her, the airbenders and this peaceful home either. Is it because he’s not yet as keen as seeing Tarrlok again? After calling him a weakling in that storm? After leaving him to the wolves? “We just won’t be in the same house anymore. I’ll visit, right Uncle?”

It takes Tarrlok a while to become acclimated with his self-proclaimed title. “Yes, of course I’ll let you visit. Your father would be _so delighted_ to know that you’ve made friends with the Avatar, Noatak.”

Noatak grimaces at the underlying insinuation, but then he remembers Yakone is gone from him. There is no use worrying. If anything, the old man would be dead by now. “See? You did promise that we’ll visit those probending athlete friends of yours.”

“Oh, yeah. We can do that tomorrow if you want. I’ll meet you-”

“You’ll meet him at City Hall, Korra. I still haven’t given up on you,” Tarrlok says as he eyes both of them behind his mug of tea. Korra laughs uneasily but even when she smiles at him, he can feel the fear settling itself somewhere close to the surface; just enough to peek through when she knows no one is looking.

When he and Tarrlok leave on the last ferry back to Republic City’s docks, they remain silent. Noatak knows that there are a million questions his brother has for him and he for his brother but they don’t verbalize any yet, not when his mind’s so preoccupied about the prospect of leaving Korra alone to her fears of that masked revolutionary, Amon. The voice in the night.

 


	3. Chapter 3

The Satomobile ride back to Tarrlok's apartment is much quieter than what Noatak would have liked. No words are exchanged and they only look through each other, past each other, at least, Tarrlok does. The man looks gaunt and fatigued beyond all telling,

It is simple to see that upon meeting Noatak unchanged after twenty-six years, to Tarrlok, seems to have taken a lot out of him. Even keeping up the charismatic façade of a politician at Air Temple Island has tired him. Perhaps his mind is reeling, but Noatak will never be able to know. He chooses not to, chooses to abandon the prospect of bloodbending Tarrlok again. He regrets doing it the first time and certainly the man's changed and grown stronger over twenty six years.

When they arrive at the building, which is much humbler than what Tarrlok's façade projects, they sit in the vehicle for a while in the dark. The driver opens the door for them in the silence and he doesn't suspect a thing, he doesn't suspect that they are much more than uncle and nephew.

"Tarrlok," he begins quietly—

"Just. Don't," Tarrlok hisses at him and it stings him much more than it should, that it reminds him so much of Yakone. "God knows I've got a lot on my plate and then you come along—" He exhales and moves out of the car, motioning for Noatak to follow. "Just don't."

The driver leaves Tarrlok with a bow and takes the Satomobile away, leaving Noatak in the middle of the sidewalk as Tarrlok opens his front door. The small apartment is located in a richer, yet quieter district of the city. The lights are out in almost every building and the ones further away light up the sky.

"You live alone?" he finds himself asking absently as he follows Tarrlok through the unlit doorway of the house.

"Not anymore."

He clamps his mouth shut and sits on the closest chair, eyeing the decorative Water Tribe pelts lining his brother's walls and the wolf-lizard throw rug on the other end of the white suede sofa. Tarrlok disappears deeper into the house and he can hear the sounds of doors being opened and blankets rustling. He rises to follow Tarrlok and finds him smoothing out the sheets and duvet in a rather empty looking spare room. He leans on the doorway and scowls at Tarrlok's indifference. It is hard to believe that the boy in the snowstorm grew up into this bitter man.

"Can I help?"

"I don't know, Noatak. Can you?"

His scowl deepens. Instead he moves to lean outside the doorway, choosing to wait for Tarrlok to finish whatever he needed to do. Never did he think that his annoying little brother would make him feel as much of an imbecile as he does now.

"This is where you'll be staying until I figure out exactly what to do with you, brother," Tarrlok says to him listlessly from inside the room. "Until then, busy yourself with your meagre pursuits of everyday life, seeing as both of us missed that when we were children. Again, Yakone would be  _absolutely delighted_  to know that you of all people have become friends with the Avatar."

Noatak wants to ask Tarrlok, wants to demand, as to how and why he became so bitter. But, of course, he already knows. They say nothing to each other as they both disappear into their own rooms. Not even with a good night or a good-bye.

As Noatak lies on his unexpectedly comfortable bed, he thinks of how much it alarms him that his brother, his younger, caring brother has turned into this cold and indifferent, yet ambitious man. It scares him more than the thought of Yakone lifting a finger against them even as he'd been aware of the fact that they were his own sons.

* * *

The morning is easier on him than the encounter from the night previous. But it takes for him a while to get out of bed. Not even the beds they his mother had made were this comfortable, and as he runs his hands through the pelts of wolf, bear, and narwhal, he thinks of how Tarrlok's managed to create such a haven in so little amount of time.

He forces himself out of bed when he hears bare feet, Tarrlok's bare feet, padding through the hallway. As he leaves his dark room, he thinks of Korra and how she's coping. He thinks of the chances she's had another nightmare about that masked revolutionary, and he imagines what it's like being around her and her poorly-hidden anxiety. It is a pity that he's only he who's even remotely aware about it; he would have been surprised if Tenzin hadn't found out yet.

He finds Tarrlok seated at the kitchen counter with a cup of tea and his eyes scanning through Republic City's newspaper. Before he can get a word out, of thanking him for the bed and the shelter, Tarrlok listlessly cuts him off, again. He scowls.

"One of my men should arrive soon to fit and tailor a new set of clothes for you, Noatak-" he takes a sip of the tea and flips a newspaper. "Until then, there's some leftover seaweed noodles in the cooler in the back and some tea in a kettle over by the stove."

He settles himself across Tarrlok with a bowl of leftovers and tea in hand, looking at the newspaper, its headlines reading  _'Equalists' Unauthorized Announcement Sends New Waves of Hysteria to the City'_.

He doesn't notice himself saying quietly to Tarrlok, "You look like  _him._ "

And for the first time since the night before, Tarrlok actually looks at him, and he really looks at him. For a split second, he feels his brother's blood actually boiling, and his fists clench themselves impulsively as he readies himself for any lurid attack that Tarrlok would have at him. But Tarrlok is not Yakone and the concentrated rage and anger dissipates.

They never say his name. And that will have been the final time Noatak even implies at anything. His brother's changed in many ways that it's so terrifying, but then, that is what twenty-six years does to a man.

Tarrlok speaks this time, his tea is finished and his voice is flat. "How are you here, Noatak? You haven't aged a day since I last saw you."

"I have no idea, Tarrlok," he answers weakly, as though his own bewilderment physically pains him. He looks up to see the worried look on Tarrlok face, and he realises, he savours that look. A look of absolute concern that can almost pass as paternal care, at least, with  _his_  face and Tarrlok's nature as a brother as well as his age.

He carries on speaking; anything to keep that look on Tarrlok's face last longer than it needs to. While Noatak keeps his face blank, his voice falters and his hands shake underneath the kitchen counter. "I remember bending  _him_  and asking you to come with me. When you refused, I remember running away and-"

"We thought you died!" Noatak jumps at the sound of Tarrlok's fist hitting the counter. He realises that Tarrlok cannot even bear to look at him, instead, the man begins to pace around the kitchen, his breathing erratic. "We looked for you, we looked for two days and never once did we think to go back to tell our mother! She never knew about the bloodbending, but she didn't have to. She wasn't the same after you left, and the same went for Yakone. He stopped the bloodbending training, Noatak. He stopped those plans of his to take over the city when you left."

"Good riddance," he finds himself spitting out. His hands writhe in his lap, twisting and turning, imagining Yakone taking a worse beating from his hand than the one he left with him all those years ago. He doesn't see Tarrlok being able to read his eyes and hands from across the room. He doesn't feel Tarrlok reading him like he does to Korra and everyone else he's met.

"Selfish."

Noatak barely hears the word but it is enough to make him want to disappear from this place. One word is all it takes for him to shatter. When he hears the doorbell ring and sees Tarrlok regain his composure enough to answer it, he panicks.

"I shouldn't have left you there, Tarrlok. I'm sorry-"

"You shouldn't have ran."

He expects Tarrlok to crack in his composure. He expects Tarrlok to shout and yell but this empty tone his brother manages stings so much more than he can imagine.

His forehead meets the kitchen counter to the muffled sound of Tarrlok greeting the tailor at the front door.

* * *

As Noatak loosens his collar on the Satomobile ride to City Hall, he spots Korra weaving through the traffic on her polar bear-dog. Tarrlok sits across him on the ride, his face hidden the newspaper which Noatak thinks that he's finished by now. They still say nothing to each other and the air that hangs over them is more despondent than that of the previous night and he wonders if the two of them will ever recover.

He did not think that Tarrlok can ever become so vicious. He doesn't want to think it, but they are truly their father's children.

Korra arrives at City Hall before them and immediately Tarrlok's façade shifts at the sight of her. Noatak merely rolls his eyes as he trails behind his brother's strut. The man is a ridiculously charismatic politician, Noatak muses.

"Ah, Avatar Korra, it's lovely seeing you up so early for the day," Tarrlok greets her while Noatak walks up to Naga, petting her fur with a quiet hello.

"Hah, yeah. Well, we've got lots to do," Korra answers confidently, giving no hint of anxiety that's just underneath that Noatak can sense so easily. He sighs and internally wishes this charade of his brother's would be over soon. "I told Noatak that I'd show him around the city so we've got a lot of ground to cover."

"No doubt you'll show  _my nephew_  the more appealing venues our city has to bring," Tarrlok laughs before turning to City Hall itself. "Well then, I won't keep you from your duties-" Tarrlok glances at Noatak, the first actual look they share since the discussion they had this morning. "-Ah, Noatak, a quick word?"

His hands begin to wring themselves in his pockets but he keeps his face blank. Whatever authority he's had over his brother in the past has very clearly shifted and now it's Tarrlok whom he holds with weary regard.

When his brother's hand lightly grasps his shoulder, it is not vice-like nor painful. It is the warmth that he can clearly see that's reflected in Tarrlok's eyes. Tarrlok's voice is quiet, gentle.

"Noatak, I know that you've always been the better bender between the two of us, but  _please_ , use your judgement. I am not like  _him_ that I would frighten you into following whatever I say, but I  _beg_  of you, don't do what he's taught us. Keep yourself from doing it, no one must know."

Bloodbending, Tarrlok means. Noatak sees no longer the weak younger brother in the past but a stronger man, someone who's controlled himself all these years no matter what the situation. Tarrlok's held bloodbending back for twenty-six years and he couldn't even keep himself from calming the Avatar down because it  _annoyed_  him. Certainly, Tarrlok is a stronger man than he, and he tastes acid in his mouth because of it.

"I swear on it."

Then Tarrlok takes him, embraces him, and not for the first time Noatak feels smaller than his younger brother. The thought makes his eyes water. He blinks away any beginnings of his tears as soon as Tarrlok lets him go.

"I expect him back by the end of the day, Korra." And with that Tarrlok disappears into the building. Korra notices nothing as she jumps atop Naga. She grins madly as he walks over to them.

"Nice duds, Noatak." She points to his new and still rigid clothes that were forced on him by the cranky tailor from earlier in the morning. He subconsciously reaches up and pulls his collar looser. "They make you look, I dunno, classier-"

He scoffs as he gets behind her, urging her to move. "Is that your way of saying that there's only room for only one Water Tribe native around?"

"Maybe, maybe," she laughs and he rolls his eyes at her. Even at the face of her smiles, he can still sense that uneasiness about her, which doesn't even take his bloodbending to guess. As they pass through the main street, avoiding Satomobiles and Hot Rods and the like, she glances back at him with a question.

"Hey, Noatak. What do you think about that Task Force your uncle has? The one he talked about last night?"

"What about it?"

"I mean, do you think it's right that he's got that Task Force and rounding up the Equalists? It'd be like throwing firewood into a wildfire," she says to him in hushed tones that he strains to hear over the traffic. A motorist swears at them as them nudge his run down Cabbage Car.

She's right, of course. She's the Avatar.

But she's too scared to realise that.

Too scared of Amon, too scared of what the city thinks.

Too scared to airbend.

"That's true," he says tentatively. "But then what other choice does the government have if the Equalists are fighting back? I'm not from around here but I've guessed as much. My father always said to fight fire with fire."

He mentally slaps himself for saying that, but he realises that that's exactly what Tarrlok's doing. He realises that they need to talk about that. He sighes and instead looks about the unfamiliar street that the zoom through, and seeing the shops and buildings thin out to a longer isolated dock ahead of them. His eyes stay on a large domed building in the middle of the bay, its golden head shining in his eyes.

"What's this place?" he asks.

"I told you that I'd take you to meet my other friends, didn't I?" Now her excitement is deep, and her anxiety is low. He's happy for her, he truly is, but he is still confused.

"Yeah, and your friends are what?"

She pulls Naga to an abrupt stop and whirls around to face him with a look of utter bafflement as though he's grown a second head.

"You're joking right?"

"I'm not-"

"This is the Pro-bending Arena and my friends and I are Pro-benders."

"Honestly, you could have been talking in a different language for all I care, Korra."

And she almost punches him for that. She steers Naga closer to the Arena and he cannot even protest when she takes the front of his jacket and pulls him inside.

"Sweet mother of Kyoshi, we've got a lot of ground to cover."

* * *


	4. Chapter 4

Noatak's face betrays no emotion when he eyes Korra and her friend circling him at the opposite end of the Probending gym. The armour that was forced on him earlier is an unwelcome shift in his balance but it is nothing that he cannot adapt to. His head snaps to Bolin when he feels the earthbender begin an assault on him. He smiles inwardly, feigning surprise as the disks fly and him but he quickly slides out of the line of fire, rolling away from the earthbender but not retaliating.

When he feels Korra and her beginning to throw blasts of flame at him, Noatak rolls out of the way and pushes himself off the ground quickly. Still not retaliating, he finds himself trapped between them, Korra eyeing him in irritation and Bolin breathing heavily.

He lets slip a snide remark. "Oh, come on now. Is that your best? Really?"

Korra thinks he's let his guard down, and Bolin follows. They launch a barrage at him simultaneously and he moves directly in-between them, ducking and dodging, feeling flame and rock whiz past his head and arms. He hears Korra groan amidst the cloud of dust and he hears Bolin exhaling rapidly but he doesn't give them any respite.

This time he attacks, bringing a waterwhip and directs it at Korra before she can even begin to blast at him again. At the sound of her hitting the ground, he twists away at another disk that Bolin sends flying at him.

When the dust cloud clears, it is Bolin against himself now. While he can sense Korra pulling off her helmet and watching them intently, he directs his focus back to the earthbender. Bolin purses his lips behind his helmet, his green eyes squinting as to figure out how to approach him next.

Noatak advances before he can even bring an earth disk to defend himself. He brings the still airborne waterwhip hard onto Bolin's left side. Bolin sputters as he collapses, his now-drenched hair covering his eyes and part of his helmet.

Elation is what he feels but he dares not to show it. Not when Tarrlok's words of him to avoid bloodbending echo in his mind. Instead he throws his helmet off and bends away the water from Bolin's uniform. Wordlessly, he holds out his hand for Bolin to stand up with. The earthbender grins and Noatak's chest clenches at how much the guy reminds him of Tarrlok when they were younger.

"Noatak, you sure you haven't heard of Probending before? Because that was just incredible!" Bolin shamelessly gushes and he can't help but blush by the guy's honesty. And it isn't just Bolin's words that shake him, it's also the man's air. It's so honest that it's refreshing. Korra snorts and walks over to them, fixing one of her ponytails. She gives him a playful punch on the arm before taking his helmet.

"He's lying, Bolin!" Korra jests, before holding an arm out to catch the helmet Bolin tosses her.  _So this is what she busies herself with_ , Noatak muses. He admits that it is quite enjoyable.

"I am not!" Noatak laughs, bending away the rest of the puddles that remain on the gym floor while Bolin dusts away the debris with a smile. "We don't have intense sports like this in the North Pole. But I have to admit, that was fun. Plus, I don't think my dad was one for sports anyway."

Again, he mentions his father, acid coating his mouth and another false truth based on his past. Yakone would not even think of them of even having any other interests other than being his tools and his outlet of revenge.

"No kidding, man. Not even Korra was  _that_  good her first time—" Noatak backs away when the ground cracks open and Bolin sinks in it much quicker than he anticipated. He glances at Korra emerging from the locker room, free of the Probending armour, a scowl on her lips and her stance daring Bolin to speak more than she'd like. "Okay, I meant to say that you were just  _a little bit_  better than Korra. I yield, uncle-"

Immediately, Bolin shoots up from the ground and lands on the floor in a crumpled heap. Noatak moves to help him up and Korra dusts her hands off on her pants. "It would have been fairer if Mister Hat-trick was actually here though. Where is Mako anyway, Bolin? Isn't he the one who's real uppity about training and all?"

"He stepped out and went to the powerplant so that he can get paid." Noatak heard the discomfort in Bolin's tone and in Korra's defeated reaction. "We still need to ante up those yuans, remember? It's not like we're gonna get it though. Miracles are hard to come by."

"Oh man, how could I forget?" Noatak gestures for her to elaborate with a raised eyebrow. "Oh, I haven't told you that we need cash to actually be a part of the Championships. Like, a whole ton of cash that we don't have."

"I see." As the air that hangs over them grows tense, Noatak clears his throat and excuses himself to get changed. While he pulls on his shirt, he stays close to the door, enough to hear the two of them conversing in a much easier manner than with Noatak actually around.

"How are you holding up, Korra?" Bolin asks quietly while Noatak fixes his buttons up. He feels Korra tense, and he can vividly imagine what worries her. He recalls of when she's told him about the gathering, about Amon's revelation, about this cheerful earthbender almost losing his bending to that madman.

"Oh, I'm fine," Korra answers poorly. If Bolin's noticed, he doesn't bring it up. "I should be asking you that question, you're the one who almost lost their bending-"

"I'm fine, Korra." Bolin's tone is light-hearted but with Noatak's keen sense, he can tell that the guy is anything but, his emotions hidden better than Korra's distress. "I mean, I still can't sleep well, since he was all  _'I will take away your bending forever,'_  with that creepy mask of his. But hey, I'm doing better. It's all thanks to you, Korra. Thanks for saving my butt back at that rally."

Noatak can actually hear the smile in Bolin's voice, and it was a warm smile, one that guaranteed her to spare him the anxieties. As he pulls on his jacket, Noatak steps out of the locker room, pretending to dust himself off and push the hair from his eyes as though he's heard nothing. And they suspect nothing.

"Whelp, I'm gonna go get changed, we need to hang out and I need to know Noatak's secrets," Bolin jokes, swinging an arm around Noatak's shoulders briefly before heading into the locker room.

"For the record, I don't have any secrets," he coughs.

"Keep telling yourself that, Noatak," Korra baits with a grin.

He ignores the jab and points to the city skyline outside. It is high noon now, the sun beating its rays down on the city in blinding amounts, a contrast from the cold evenings a few days past. "Where are we off to now?"

"Well, there's not much of a point in waiting on Mako so we'll head back to Air Temple Island and just relax for the rest of the day."

He nods and crosses his arms, watching Korra saunter around the gym, her foot tapping in an uneven rhythm, betraying even the smallest bit of her anxiety. Noatak seizes it bluntly.

"Are you all right, Korra?" he asks in a manner different from Bolin's, in a much more cold and calculating tone. One that's bound to make the fear rise inside her. He does not lust for that fear but she needs to get it out somehow and Noatak firmly believes keeping it inside will not do her any good. "And don't lie to me, I know you're not all right. I can tell."

She hesitates and he sees the same fear reminiscent of the one he witnessed that night of Amon's radio broadcast in her eyes. It is odd, that look she gives him. It is something he does not take a liking to, as though she sees him for who he really is. And he realises, he fears that look, he detests it. He does not wish it to be a look that she can readily give him. Before she can sputter out an answer or an excuse, she straightens up and keeps her composure as Bolin barrels into the room.

"ALL RIGHT TEAM, WHERE ARE WE OFF TO?!" Bolin absolutely yells as he pushes both of them out of the gym. Noatak sighs and laughs easily, covertly dispelling that fear that Korra gathers  _for him_  away. He'll deal with it later, as he always does. Tarrlok does not have to know nor find out.

* * *

The first thing he hears when he returns to Air Temple Island in the afternoon is Ikki shrieking questions at him,  _'Are you gonna be staying over for dinner? Are you sleeping over? Did Ponytail Man get sick of you and told you to come back here? Nice clothes, Noatak! Do you want to play Pai Sho? Jinora told me to leave her alone and—'_  before Korra excuses herself and leads Ikki away from them much to Bolin's confusion.

"I was staying with the Airbenders before my uncle came to get me," he supplies helpfully when they lead Naga back to her stables. Bolin settles down beside him and both of them lean against the polar bear-dog, brushing away any clumps in her fur.

"Oh, okay," Bolin nods. Pabu jumps away from him and climbs atop Naga's head, nestling himself there. "I thought you were her cousin or whatever, though. I mean, similar hairstyles and all?"

"Yeah, the airbender kids tell me that too. She's just a friend though, really." He finds himself thinking of the truth in those words. Is she really  _just_  a friend? She is different from the girls back in his village, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Noatak swallows down any other uncouth thoughts of her that resurface in his mind. He doesn't notice his hands subconsciously clenching and unclenching themselves so hard that it leaves marks on his skin. He begins to hear Tarrlok's jibes for taking a liking to her and Yakone's abuse for even thinking on it and he shakes his head. Bolin seems intent on smoothing out a knot in Naga's fur that he doesn't notice.

"So what are you going to do now? I mean, what happened exactly? Korra said that you were thrown overboard off a ship-" Noatak laughs at his tactlessness but he knows it is well-meaning.

"It's all up to my uncle, really. Since he's the one taking care of me for the moment, I guess." And he doesn't need to feign his bitterness about it. Tarrlok has changed, there was no denying that but there really is something disheartening about being taken care of by the same little brother that he's left in the storm with Yakone. While he wishes to be surprised that Tarrlok still hasn't thrown him out and left him to starve in the city streets, he knows his brother and his caring nature.

What he doesn't expect is that same care coupled with Tarrlok's severity as an adult and politician. But even Noatak is aware that his brother is trying his hardest not to snap back into what they grew up with, that his brother is trying to be a better parent than Yakone.

"Well, at least he's not forcing you to be a shut-in or worse," Bolin muses as he looks to him with understanding.

"Worse?" Oh, he knows of what is worse. Bolin gladly doesn't bring it up. "What about you? Where are your parents?"

Immediately, he regrets asking when he sees the crestfallen look that graces Bolin's eyes. "We lost them when we were little so Mako's been taking care of me ever since-" Noatak looks away and draws circles in the dirt with his finger. He brings his eyes to the ground, not wanting to meet Bolin's eyes for fear of seeing Tarrlok in them, for fear of vividly hearing Tarrlok as both a child and an adult yell and scream at him for being a failure of an older brother. Bolin continues, "I mean, I turned out all right, didn't I? So he did well."

"Yeah, you did. I may not know you or Korra for very long but you guys seem all right, better than all right actually," and he gives Bolin a reassuring grin that's been lost on Tarrlok in the past. A big brother's grin if it need be named. Though by now, he's established that Korra and her friends are older than him, but not necessarily more mature, and Bolin? He may be sixteen and two years older than Noatak but Noatak treats him like he should have treated Tarrlok in the past. He is just grateful that neither he nor Korra act like he's not worthy of their time simply because he's younger.

"Haha, thanks, man. But seriously though, what are you gonna do now?"

"I don't know-"

"What about Probending?" Bolin asks, hopeful. Oh, he knows that look. Yes, he's seen Tarrlok use that many times when he wanted something, though Bolin seems more curious than actually demanding. "I mean, you're really good at it, Noatak. And I mean,  _really good_. You're definitely sure you haven't done any sport of it before?"

"Well, yeah." If he considers bloodbending a sport then he might as well throw himself off a cliff now. "I'm just a quick learner, is all. It's very exciting though. No wonder Korra enjoys it better than Airbending practice-"

"Are you guys talking about me?" Korra asks, poking her head into the stables with a grin.

"Oh, no, not at all," Bolin begins smoothly and Noatak chuckles, seeing where the conversation was going. "No, we  _were_  talking about Noatak's first time Probending compared to your first time Probending-"

"H-hey! I got better! How do you think we got into the Championships?!"

"We got in because of my good looks," Bolin quips seriously, running a hand through his coiffed hair. Korra rolls her eyes before playing along with the banter, cooing and swooning over her teammate like a love struck twit. Noatak feels pain in his jaw as he attempts to keep his face straight. "And the refs loved my face so much that they want to keep seeing it again. Don't worry, I love my face too-"

"Delivery for Avatar Korra," A high-pitched voice calls from outside the stables and three of them stop fooling around at the sight of a large flower-filled basket with a set of legs ushering it. Korra glances at him and Bolin in confusion as a weedy, grey-haired man in large glasses steps from behind the basket. He directs his attention at Korra, ignorant of the low growls coming from Naga behind them. "Tarrlok sends his compliments and urges you to reconsider his offer."

Noatak rolls his eyes and his hands meet his forehead. But Korra coolly sends the council page on his way, telling the man that she hasn't changed her mind. The council page then turns to Noatak, an apologetic look on his face.

"Apologies, Avatar Korra, but Councilman Tarrlok has asked me to escort his nephew back safely to City Hall as well as relaying his gift to you-"

"Who's this Tarrlok guy? Is he bothering you? Noatak, Korra? 'Cause I could have a word with him," Bolin cuts in, his brow furrowed in confusion at Noatak's exasperated face-rubbing.

Noatak politely turns to the council page. "Can you give me a few moments, please? I'll meet you at the docks."

He lets out a sigh worthy of people who are much more teenager-y than he was. Korra smiles sadly and pats him on the back.

"He's just some old guy who works with Tenzin on the council." Noatak laughs internally at Tarrlok's possible reaction to being called 'old' but he focuses instead on more pressing matters, like bringing up the fact that even he thinks that this  _Task Force_  he plans for Korra is a terrible idea and will not be taken well by the non-bender population. If anything, it would serve to aggravate them and push the Equalists to further execute any planned attack for them. Here he was, fifteen in the next winter and planning to discuss war tactics with his thirty-seven year old younger brother over dinner in the next few hours.

"And he's my uncle. The one I told you about."

"Oh, OH! Well, it could be much worse, right?"  _Definitely_ , he answers in his head but instead both of them eye Korra as she pokes the flowers from the basket experimentally.

"Let me guess, he's going to keep sending me gifts until I say yes, huh?" Her grimace is understandable because Noatak knows how annoying Tarrlok could sometimes be.

"Yep."

"Next thing we know, he'll send you a Satomobile or something-" Bolin jokes but halts at Noatak's scowl.

"Don't tempt it."

Bolin walks over to examine the basket, picking out a tin of Fire Flakes and pointing at it, asking for permission to eat it silently. She laughs and waves him off before turning back to Noatak.

"Let me see you out-"

"Don't worry about it, Korra." He is tired when interrupts her but it comes off as cold, detached, and Korra steps back as if she'd been burned. He rubs his face, already exhausted at the prospect of facing Tarrlok but she does not know that. She thinks him as tired of them, of her and he knows it hurts her. He sighs. "Look, thank you for showing me town and all. Probending was great, really. I enjoyed it, and it was nice seeing you again. I'll see you soon, all right?"

He doesn't realise that he walks over to her to give her a hug. He doesn't even do hugs, yet here he is, feeling Korra freeze up initially before pressing her face into his shoulder. He doesn't linger and pulls away, Korra's breath still warm on his shoulder and his waist warms where her hands were. Bolin stares at them curiously, handing Pabu a Fire Flake before shrugging, deciding it was nothing.

"I'll catch you both later. Nice to meet you, Bolin." Yet even as he heads down to the docks, he can still feel Korra's heart beating in his ears, though it is not erratic but calm. It is not bloodbending that does thing but his actually touch instead. He smiles to himself.

The prospect of talking to Tarrlok however turns that smile into a scowl.


End file.
